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How Tech-Savvy Will the Next President Be?
CorinneI writes "We've got our candidates. We know their positions on the major issues of the day — healthcare, the Iraq war, the economy, yada, yada, yada. But Senators McCain and Obama will also have to be concerned with tech issues. Where do they stand on Net neutrality, patent protection, piracy, broadband, privacy, and H1B visas? Do their campaign positions match up with their voting records and public statements? Here's how they stack up on the big five tech issues of the day."
Also, don't forget that McCain inexplicably supports telecom immunity..
I'd much rather have a President who surrounds himself with well-informed advisors, than a President who weighs his own opinions on specialized topics more heavily than a specialist's opinion. Leadership is delegation.
Cretin - a powerful and flexible CD reencoder
Totally inadequate.
Let us not become the evil that we deplore.
This is like the NRA saying I wander how familiar the new president will be with regards to the barrel modification on my new Desert Eagle.
That's why he has advisor's, who typically are leaders in their field. With all due respect in the light of the state of the economy, housing, petroleum, national security this stuff matters not. The new president will be so busy trying to clean up more important stuff that things like net neutrality will probably never come up as an issue until term two if that happens.
Without reading the article, I can guess it tracks this format pretty closely:
Q: What would {Obama,McCain} do about $TECH_ISSUE?
Obama: Emphasises coming up with solution that works for ALL Americans by making impossible tradeoff. Says soundbite taken from Lawrence Lessig.
McCain: Emphasises coming up with solution that works for ALL Americans by making impossible tradeoff. Says soundbite taken from corporate lobbyist.
Does that about sum it up?
Information theory is life. The rest is just the KL divergence.
True, but surrounding yourself with well-informed advisors requires the ability to recognize someone that is well-informed. This is difficult to do without having some level of knowledge yourself.
Because that worked so well with the last guy.
No Longer a Menace to Society.
Alexandria Morrigan born 2/22/01 l. 20.5in wt. 7 lbs. 5 oz.
I believe The Simpsons tackled this very subject in They Saved Lisa's Brain--an episode in which Mensa gains control of Springfield. Horrible legislation ensues.
The president should represent the average person of the United States of America. Someone who compiles Linux is not your average person.
We should really pay attention to how they vote, who their delegate these issues to, who they listen to and--most importantly--how willing they are to bow to the companies for an extra buck.
My work here is dung.
I agree with your basis, but it does help if they have at least a working knowledge of the topic they are making decisions on. In short, a "Jack of all trades, Ace of none" style of president would be ideal. They could support their short comings with experts in the field, yet still understand it enough to make informed, logical decision on the matter.
"I only know 2 things: The love for me, and the fear of me."
But at that point it's more about reading people than knowing the subject material. Having a strong ethical foundation will also factor in.
Cretin - a powerful and flexible CD reencoder
It costs $10,000 to run a cable or fiber to my house. If we're waiting for "market competition" to make it happen, then it will NEVER happen, because there is no way Comcast or Verizon would ever recoupe their investment. "Whiz to Coho" says they can't get a wireless signal at my house 'cause of all the trees, and HughesNet satellite internet sucks! My only hope is some sort of universal access initiative. But then, I was going to vote for Obama anyway.
If the president is to have so much power, shouldn't he be knowledgeable about what he has power over? I don't want some average Joe coding my software. A president should be someone "special", if he is to be elected, he should be the role model of the average person, not the average person himself.
Disclaimer: I am not god.
We may not be created equal
But we can be treated equal.
Bush/Cheney value loyalty far, far more than intelligence, expertise, or performance. They appointed a plague of loyal idiots.
That was the argument for why Bush was an acceptable President. "It doesn't matter that he has no foreign policy knowledge, is not intelligent, and cannot string two sentences together. As long as he has good advisors, everything will be fine."
We see how that turned out.
Having excellent advisors is an absolute requirement. It is necessary, but not sufficient, for a good presidency. You definitely need someone at the top who is able to digest all the inputs and provide the guidance and accountability.
Overall, it's pretty predictable: The democrat wants more government regulation, the Republican wants less government involvement. Shockers all around. (Though the wiretapping issue is the one thing that's not so obvious.)
Warning: Apple/Nintendo fangirl. Likes her electronics cute & cuddly. May be rabid.
JFK's advisors didn't suggest putting a man on the moon. They were quite resistant to the idea. On the other hand, Iraq was a "slam dunk" according to Bush's advisors...
How can you identify a "well informed" advisor if you have no knowledge on the subject yourself?
But they'll appear perfectly sincere and trustworthy.And they can fake that as easily as they can fake technical knowledge. It's even EASIER.
There is NO substitute for personal knowledge.
After reading your issue all I have to say is
You people suck.
Specifically, its people like you that give reason for this government to run us all over.
So, since you won't or cannot pay 10 grand its okay to let to government expend that money to connect your residence?
worse, you probably don't see the problem with it from the wording of your post.
The corporations are right not doing it, the government would be wrong to do so. When people put themselves into situations they should be responsible to get themselves out.
Selfish. Let me guess, I should pay for other people being fat, lazy, and drinking too?
Karma is good when you have so much to burn, but damn your type really pisses me off.
* Winners compare their achievements to their goals, losers compare theirs to that of others.
But are Bush's advisers really that good? Someone else pointed out that Bush is all about loyalty, not necessarily the right person for the job.
Bush picked cronies and yes-men above all else. Haven't we heard a number of stories of Bush refusing to listen to those who disagree, simply because they disagree?
One, that's hardly a geek issue. Two, I've asked on slashdot a bunch of times, but never gotten an answer: Why is the 2nd amendment more important than the 1st, 4th, 5th, 6th, 7th, 8th, 9th, 13th, 14th, 15th, 19th let alone them combined? Third, other than showing respect for the Constitution, why is the 2nd useful? In other words, why not overturn it (assuming you read the preamble to it in the manner the NRA prefers.)? Your handguns aren't really going to allow you to compete with the US military, and every idiot cannot be trusted with a tank, so any forced overthrow arguement is crap. And while I believe in guns for hunting and home protection, there are a lot of restrictions that you can place on weapons that people seem to think violate the 2nd amendement without getting close to either one of those.
I'm really trying to figure out why anyone cares about this issue.
Your ad here. Ask me how!
Anecdotal evidence is one thing, but basing your opinion on a cartoon portrayal of what "might" happen is extreme even for /.
That's not necessarily true. If two politicians felt they needed an expert on, say, managing the development of a large piece of code, one candidate might pick Linus Torvalds while another might pick Bill Gates. Both would certainly be qualified, but the one that would be selected is the one that lines up with your ideals on what the development should be like. If the candidate doesn't have an opinion on an issue that they're to be in charge of, that's especially dangerous, as they'll simply pick whoever exudes "qualified" the most, whether or not they're actually the best choice.
All executive power stems from the president, and all cabinet members serve at their discretion. The president's views are ultimately what matter.
"Lock and load, Brides of Christ!"
These are not very difficult issues to understand.
Is it fair to have different speeds for different sites based if they paid _your_ ISP for faster speed.
How do we get faster internet connections to the rural comunites.
Should software be patented if so should there be different rules.
Is outsourcing tech workers best for America.
The issues are really people and policy issue (stuff that a president should be able to make decisions on themselfs) It is not as much on the details like what routers they should use or how to setup something.
That is the problem with IT today in america IT People think they are so smart that the average joe has no understanding on what is going on. The average joe knows more then you think, and is able to make good decisions without a tech guy going to them Hey try this it is really 7337 or hey man don't be a n00b and go that way.
If something is so important that you feel the need to post it on the internet... It probably isn't that important.
The general rationale is that the 2nd amendment is the ultimate protection of all the others. You have a decent agreement that we're not really going to overthrow the government with civilian-held firearms, but that entire scenario is a bit of a stretch. However, I CAN defend certain aspects of some of my freedoms with my guns.
The other side of the argument is the bumper-sticker slogan "If guns are criminal, only criminals will have guns" which bears a certain amount of truth - criminals aren't going to disarm in America, and disarming those of us who are law-abiding only makes us more vulnerable to attacks on our life, liberty, and property.
Unfortunately, what Harry Truman said is true: people with median skills and intelligence are more likely to be elected than geniuses. The median voter is afraid of geniuses.
However, this doesn't mean a person with average intelligence would make a better president than someone more intelligent. The ideal president would be intelligent, well informed, and have good advisors. After all, if the president isn't intelligent and well informed, how will he know which advice to follow?
Because the 2nd Amendment is the one that gives us the ability to throw the reset switch if all else fails. And yes, that's exactly what it's for; all the bullshit reasons about (government-controlled) militias, self-defense, and hunting is just that: bullshit. The guys who wrote the Constitution had just finished violently overthrowing their government, so they wanted to explicitly reaffirm the right to do so again. Period.
On the contrary, the Iraqi "insurgents" don't have tanks, and look how well they're doing! Handguns I agree about, though, which is why I believe the ban on "assault weapons" is unconstitutional.
"[Regarding the 'cloud,'] ownership was what made America different than Russia." -- Woz
The president should represent the average person of the United States of America. Someone who compiles Linux is not your average person.
So you're saying GWB was a good representative?
I'm being serious. If the President should represent the average person, I'd say Bush was a good candidate. I don't happen to think he has done this country any service, much less good service, but he does qualify as "average" in most aspects other than wealth.
"Growing old is inevitable; growing up is optional."
You're right, he did it of his own free will- that should scare you.
Sigs are too short to say anything truly profound so read the above post instead.
The general reason is because more intelligent people tend to think they know more and are better qualified to determine "what's best", whether that's true or not.
Intelligence has absolutely nothing to do with the quality of laws we create. Common sense sometimes has something to do with the quality of laws and, unfortunately, common sense isn't.
"Growing old is inevitable; growing up is optional."
Every armed resistence in America worthy of the name, including the American Revolution, required stealing munitions from the military; Exception: the Whiskey Rebellion which was beaten into the ground in about as much time as it took to march troops to the battlefield.
Your ad here. Ask me how!
I loved Jon Stewart's comments on allegations of elitism. To paraphrase:
"Doesn't "elite" mean "the best"? You applying for a position that, if you do a good enough job, people may carve your face into the side of a mountain. If you don't think you're better than us, why are you running?"
"Lock and load, Brides of Christ!"
Someone who "compiles Linux" is average. Just as average as someone who rebuilds their car's engine, or does their own carpentry, or grows their own garden, or .... Most Americans have a few things they have at least a good amateur's expertise in, if not professional qualifications. And some of us have even mastered the arcane "./compile;make;make install".
"with their freedom lost all virtue lose" - Milton
You subhuman primate. "Ugh, Violence best for get what you want." Thankfully, most humans aren't violent fucks who think the only way to solve a problem is to kill someone.
What's so sick and disgusting about the far right is that they think taking up arms ever solves anything, rather than perpetuating the problem.
- None can love freedom heartily, but good men; the rest love not freedom, but license. -- John Milton
His personal income (as reflected in his tax returns) does not reflect campaign contributions. But then, if you had half a clue about such things, you wouldn't be defending Republicans who are the telecom industry's bought-and-paid-for toadies. The "bank records" might better be interpreted as those records that indicate who paid what to whom and when in exchange for what no-bid contracts, etc., but the point is valid, nonetheless.
Taking guns out of criminal hands is EXACTLY what many lefties think is going to happen with all their anti-gun legislation. They often react rather vehemently when ever a gun crime is committed, and believe that simply outlawing firearms will somehow fix the problem. Criminals with guns may make them easy to identify, but it also makes them dangerous to the general populace, and I cannot depend on the police to protect me against an armed opponent.
Semi-auto firearms hold more bullets, and are easier to load and reload. In a self-protection need, I can slap a clip into a semi-auto, pull the slide, and be ready to go in less time than I can load my revolver (unless I have a speed-loader). Semi-autos which are left unloaded with the clip nearby are safer with children around than revolvers.
My objections to firearm limitations, outside of full-auto (which are obtainable with a license in some states) is that the limitations make little to no difference in crime prevention, and the VAST majority of gun owners - something like 99% - do NOT and NEVER WILL commit a crime with a firearm, on top of which we can't get an accurate estimate on the number of times a firearm has been used to prevent a crime. Taking guns out of the hands of the law-abiding serves no real purpose.
When we have a disagreement with one group of people, why don't we grab a gun and run off to the middle east to start a war with an entirely different group of people?
Duh. Because we're smarter than you.
An isolated instance. Correlation != causation. So one thing happened and another thing happened, but that doesn't necessarily mean one caused the other. In some parts of the world, restricted gun ownership has 'reduced' crime by your logic. (Note there's no proof, it's all correlation.)
On the other hand, I am a firm believer that Doom caused violent crime rates to drop in the United States. See, if you graph the release of several major First Person Shooters and the violent crime rate, you find that there's definitely a drop in crime. By your logic, that's proof right? Doom causes fewer crimes. So if we want to reduce crime, just re-release Doom! (It's GPL licensed now so you can go ahead and do that.)
Remember: CORRELATION IS NOT CAUSATION.
Repeat after me: CORRELATION IS NOT CAUSATION.
P.S.: CORRELATION IS NOT CAUSATION.
Hmmm...taking up arms was the only solution to several problems - Nazi Germany, Imperial Japan, and fascist Italy, the Afghanis kicking the Soviets out, getting the Brits to leave us the heck alone TWICE, defeating Napoleon, etc....
I get your argument, I really do, but I get a bit frustrated when vehement opponents of the war in Iraq who try and attach a "chickenhawk" label and claim it's such an injustice don't think that their cause is worth the ultimate sacrifice.
I really don't want to get into a debate on whether or not guns (in general) should be legal, illegal, regulated, restricted, etc. But I will refute a point you make.
Hear, hear! Groups with small arms have never been a match for a modern mil... Oh, wait.
Insurgency or guerrilla war relies more weapons like mortars, rockets, RPGs, mines (IEDs), etc. than on small arms. This is because a symmetric battle between a trained military force with small arms and insurgent forces (also with small arms) usually is a loss for the insurgents. Explosives and other munitions are usually more valuable.
Thus I personally find the argument that firearm ownership help in any "revolution" to be dubious. More useful would be explosives and skills in bomb-making.
The difference between the Republicans and Democrats isn't more or less government involvement, they both want to spend more money. The difference is that the Republicans favor a top-down approach, that is, if you grease the gears at the top, it'll "trickle down" to the people at the bottom. There are historical examples of this working, and examples of it not working. The Democrats favor a bottom-up approach, thinking that if you provide for people's basic needs -now- they can start working on valuable contributions to society without having to worry about their personal wellbeing or a reliable paycheck while they make those changes to their lifestyle that they want (go back to school, etc.) There are historical examples of that working too.
So which one is right? NEITHER. It doesn't matter who you vote for, they're both interested in spending our money. The difference is whether right now you think one method or the other will help the economy more. Well, we've had 8 years of top-down and it's done nothing but hurt the majority of US citizens. That's why I'll vote Obama.
The whole purpose of the 2nd amendment is to ensure military-grade weapons (flint-lock muskets at the time) remain in the hands of ordinary citizens. Today, that would include a lot more than just hunting rifles. It may seem scary to have such powerful weapons in the hands of ordinary citizens, but to me the opposite is much scarier: a disarmed, helpless society unable to defend itself from its government. Much is made of the growing trend of government intrusion into our privacy, warrantless arrests, et al, using quotes like, "When they came for___, I said nothing." Well, when they come for you, what are you going to do?
Tic-Tac-Toe, Global Thermonuclear War, and relationships all have the same winning move.
No, instead we should be defending Democrats bought by the Hollywood community who put draconian copyright restrictions into place.
Yeah, they're all scum. Even the ones you like.
Groups with small arms are great at making things so unpleasant an occupying modern military decides it's not worth it and goes home.
But for taking over the country where that modern military is based? Useless, or worse. From the examples I can think of the key is to have enough of the populace on your side that the rank-and-file soldiers are just too embarrassed to be on the governments side. Armed Guerrillas just provide a pretext to motivate a military response.
Why does it matter how familiar they are with "tech" issues? The position of President is an executive position. His job is to execute the laws that he deems Constitutional, not dabble in legislation. That anyone is asking such questions speaks to the fact that the US is in a state of prolonged decline, with a war of all against all.
Slashdot: Playing Favorites Since 1997
Well, since all the other nine have been completely gutted without complaint from the populace, the second is no longer important.
mcgrew's razor: Never attribute to stupidity that which can be explained by greedy self-interest
Sigs are too short to say anything truly profound so read the above post instead.
Indeed it should frighten advocates of big government to learn that their opponents act on their ideas, not just because 'they are in the pockets of The Rich (tm).'
If you were accepting bribes, would you list them on your tax return?
Quite an experience to live in fear, isn't it? That's what it is to be a slave.
"Try England's crime rate as an example."
OK, I did. I expected the case would be ambiguous, but WOW, get a new example buddy! Based on the first figures I could find, the UKs per-capita murder rate is about one fifth that of the US, and the majority of the murders in the US used guns, whereas almost none in th UK did.
"Quit trying to pick and choose which ones you agree with."
For Gods sake why? This isn't holy scripture, it was written by men who did their best, and did by-and-large a damn fine job. The Second Amendment was muddily written, and is badly obsolete.
Do you know how many other elected officials AT&T supports?? Is it illegal to be a campaign supporter now? oooh 160 grand! Mccain (the millionaire) can finally buy that Taj Mahal he's been wanting.
Seriously, these implications of wrong doing are idiotic. Mccain, though I hate him, is a champion of campaign finance reform.
Friggin morons.
While you can clearly say that banning guns doesn't cause more gun crimes, the rise in gun crimes that the GP has mentioned is evidence that banning guns has been rather ineffectual at preventing gun-related crimes.
"Is that dad? Either that or Batman's really let himself go."
If their ages don't make it completely obvious
Spoken like a truly ignorant kid. Guys in their twenties come to me for advice on computers, kid. Can you write a battle tanks game in assembly and then hand-assemble it (without an assembler) and have it run, bug-free? I did.
And there are guys twenty and thirty years my senior, now retired, who used hollerith cards in their programming and make me look ignorant about computers.
You need to educate yourself. Your hatred of those with more experience than you limits your horizons and should be a great personal embarrassment to you.
mcgrew's razor: Never attribute to stupidity that which can be explained by greedy self-interest
ISPs are a natural monopoly, so your options are basically government regulation, a government-run monopoly, or the situation you currently have in the US.
And modern socialism works a lot better than you might think. Just look at Europe.
I don't think that was the posters point.
Surely, there are some problems that can only be solved through violence; it's just that getting us out of Iraq (at this point at least) just isn't one of them.
Uh, there's a little something missing at that John McCain link, namely the tax returns of the breadwinner in the McCain household, Cindy.
Anyway, do you really think Senator McCain is going to declare the income he receives from all his lobbyist buddies on his 1040? I'm pretty sure he's got a very good accountant working on his taxes ever since he got caught with the crooked Keating Five.
You are welcome on my lawn.
Jesus Christ, do you have any other tired, worn out, bullshit stereotypes to throw out?
Seriously. I'm a liberal. I know a lot of liberals. But I can't think of anyone I know who wants to ban guns. Hell, I'm a supporter of strong 2nd Amendment rights, and a lot of my friends are, also.
Newsflash: different people are different. You'll find anti-gun conservatives and you'll find pro-gun liberals, and vice-versa. If you insist on attempting to group together everyone left-of-center and claim we're all this-and-that-and-the-other, I reserve the right to call everyone right-of-center a violent hate-fulled homophobic racist backwards inbred uneducated dipshit redneck. I know that's not true, but hey, what's good for the goose, right?
Please reread the GP post. He was asking why the 'far left' do not go to Iraq and fight America, seeing as how they don't agree with US policy. Get that? He was advocating that peace activists use war to achieve peace, and stating that it was 'funny' that we don't. Yes, it's fucking hilarious. I mean, why doesn't the fire department just burn down buildings, that would certainly solve the fire problem.
- None can love freedom heartily, but good men; the rest love not freedom, but license. -- John Milton
I suspect you're one of those "both parties are exactly the same" types, but I'll bite anyways.
This administration is historically notable for the value it has placed upon loyalty of political appointees. Appointees in the Clinton administration, for example, were able to disagree with the President and Vice President without fear. Compare Madeline Albright and Condolezza Rice, for example. Or even better: Anthony Zinni and David Petraeus. Zinni, for example, frequently alluded to the wide latitude he was given at Centcom. Petraeus, on the other hand, is a leashed dog.
Do you really think Obama or McCain gets full choice of their cabinet or aides after the coming election?
Yes. It's called "being President." But if, as I suspect, you define choice as something completely unfettered by the opinions of others, then of course not. But that's a stupid definition.
It's not enough to bash in heads, you've got to bash in minds. - Captain Hammer
Amen. I am in the same boat - fairly liberal (as far as personal rights are concerned) AND a gun owner and 2nd rights supporter. I also am vehemently opposed to all these ridiculous smoking bans too, unlike most other "liberals" (I am a non-smoker, so less biased). Can someone tell me how banning things is a "liberal" attitude?
"But this one goes to 11!"
I'm not arguing the validity of gun rights, I just argue the validity of his argument for them. And your analogy, frankly, sucks. There's no cause and effect, you forget that there's a third party, a group whose duty it is to enforce the rules. Yes, even sometimes they are given exception to them. So when you make guns illegal, it's not just the criminals that have them, but in every society I've ever seen that has banned gun ownership, the police are given an exception. Your analogy has no group of bulls who are charged with preventing domestication of the cattle, your analogy does not posit the existence of a group of people whose job it is to find the stray firearms and with the force of law, remove them.
To continue on the subject of 2nd Amendment debate, where is the line drawn? Am I allowed to own a nuclear weapon to defend myself from a hostile government? A tank? An RPG? Am I allowed to possess anti-tank mines to protect myself from martial law? Why or why not?
Tackling questions like that are vital to the strength of the constitution, if we ignore them, dismiss them out of hand and ignore the people who ask tough questions, or otherwise fail to answer them, we have failed the people who ask them.
it should frighten *everyone* that Government took it upon its self to grant special powers to those who would and do threaten our civil liberties in favor of perceived safety. It shouldn't surprise anyone though and that is sad,
Sigs are too short to say anything truly profound so read the above post instead.
Actually there is no defense against a brutal cop. You are still breaking the law if you resist a cop whos breaking the law against you. You never have a legal right to resist a cop. You do however have a birthright to resist but that doesn't mean the courts wont throw your ass in jail.
unzip; strip; touch; finger; mount; fsck; more; yes; unmount; sleep
Well, if you look at the statistics from Australia, Canada, and other countries who have enacted strict gun control laws, you'll see crime stays the same or even slightly declines, and in some rare cases, slightly increases. However, digging into the details of "armed robbery" you'll see that once the gun control came into play, although armed robbery stayed consistent, the percentage involving guns actually dropped dramatically, with the difference being replaced by knives and bats, etc.
Deperaate people commit crimes, some of them with guns. Removing guns does NOT precipitate more deperate people, therefore, there is no logical support for increases in gun crime. Wether yopu have a gun or not in your house or business, you're still likely 1) to have other weapons at hand, 2) alarms or a hpne for 911 to call cops, who have guns, 3) won't be home when being robbed, and 4) won;t be killed by your robber (less than 1 % of roberies involve a victim being killed by the crook).
What you WILL get, that is STRONGLY supported by statistics, is a sharp drop in sposes shooting each other, kids shooting people accidentally, suicides, and more. In fact, even where gun crime has increased by as much as 20%, the number of deaths from guns dropped as much as 300% at the same time, simply by limiting who can own a gun.
Look into the numbers. There are links in my other posts, or simply use Google.
This is not an argument, FACT: gun control saves an order of magnitude more lives than it places at risk.
This is also not an arguement: It is NOT against the constitution for them to limit guns. The constitution clearly reads: "A well regulated Militia, being necessary to the security of a free State, the right of the people to keep and bear Arms, shall not be infringed." It is clearly laid out not as a right to bear arms for all citizens, but as a MEANS to a WELL REGULATED MILITIA. In other words, if you are not PART OF a WELL REGULATED MILITIA, then you DO NOT have a right to bear arms.
There is no contest in life for which the unprepared have the advantage.
His policies suck. But it should be obvious that McCain personally isn't tech-savvy, and not just from his publicly stated policies (from which he also has a history of reversing himself). That's what this article is about: savvy. And McCain obviously ain't, even if he does occasionally get some lobbyist to shove a tech whitepaper at him, even if that whitepaper is wrong.
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make install -not war
Please carefully use the word ignorant. The GP stated that a 47 year old is probably more savvy than a 72 year old. Like all generalizations, there are exceptions, such as you, but for the most part he is probably right on. This is more true when you consider career, and other factors (as he did).
So for you to claim that he is ignorant for pointing out what is conceded by most 70+ year olds... seems obtuse and/or ignorant.
I finally updated my sig, but now it's lame.
This is 100% misleading.
All of Obama's money comes from individual donators. When you donate you are forced to include your employer, and are limited to $2300. So what you're seeing is the aggregate of all people that work for AT&T. Guess what? They're a big fucking company. That figure includes everyone from people on the board, to bottom level accountants and janitors.
There is no problem with the government building and maintaining a comprehensive and effective infrastructure. To wit they already have.
Its the extreme cases like this that need to be held to a real standard. Look, just like schools, its easy to throw money at it irresponsibly.
So someone makes a lifestyle choice and expects others to pay for it.
You took a wonderful tack in order to deflect the issue but I can play the game.
No one builds a home off the road and expects the government to move the road, no, they pay to have a driveway to connect them to the road. As such if this AC wants a connection but not pay for it then he is being selfish. Don't play trite games, examine the issue properly. Use a valid comparison.
Your argument is no better than "its for the children" In fact its pretty much childish too.
* Winners compare their achievements to their goals, losers compare theirs to that of others.
Not an American. Just would like to know why politics there is binary. On/Off, Good/Bad, Black/White.
Seems amazingly simplistic to me.
Deleted
"There are about a dozen bars in my municipality of less than 50K people, but none of them are smoke free."
And what does that tell you about what patrons of those bars want? That should be a huge clue. If there was such a huge public outcry for smoke free establishments, there would be at least one near you.
I wouldn't have as much of a problem with the ban if the people trying to ban smoking would just be honest. They don't give a shit about "worker's health" or second hand smoke or any other such nonsense. Those are just convenient excuses for them to impose their will on the minority with an activity that they see as objectionable. I have a lot more respect for people that favor a smoking ban because they admit the think smoking is a vile, disgusting, and smelly act. That and the fact that I worked in the bar/restaurant industry for over 10 years and guess what? Not only do about 75% of the workers smoke, every single server I know has felt the economic crunch of less business after the smoking ban. So tell me exactly how making less money is helping these workers? Especially the ones that smoke first-hand and aren't concerned with second-hand smoke? See the thing is, everybody knows that smoking and second-hand smoke can be harmful to your health. The same people know that bars are smoky. And the same people chose to still work in those smoky bars. I say if you are worried about second-hand smoke, don't ban smoking everywhere - get a job where you aren't in a smoke filled room. It's not rocket science.
"But this one goes to 11!"
Is it illegal to be a campaign supporter now?
No. Maybe it should be. Until then I can take it into consideration as I decide for whom to vote for. I can do that for any arbitrary standard I determine, including the color of his socks. I try to cast my vote on the basis of what I think to be healthy to the country--and I don't think a $160K contribution will have long term healthy ramifications for our country.
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$tar -xvf
u cannot square that with "Shall not be infringed".
But how does it square with a "well regulated militia"? Last I checked a crackhead with an Uzi wasn't well regulated, or a militia.
A patriot must always be ready to defend his country against his government. -edward abbey
He can only hide behind the "I'm a hero because I crashed my plane in the jungle and then made videos for the Viet Cong" angle for so long.
Hey now. Go ahead and question how heroic getting shot down really is, at least so far as whether you can base an entire Presidency upon the fact. But "made videos for the VC" is going exactly contrary to that kind of thoughtful analysis. Because in reality he was tortured until he made videos for the VC, and eventually cracking under torture does not in any way diminish his hero status (to whatever extent that may be) because any hero would crack, eventually. The human brain is simply not designed to withstand unlimited pain, and it's a relatively simple matter to inflict enough of it that anyone will say whatever you want.
Which, by the way, is why torture is really not that useful for interrogation, because that's ultimately the result you get: Them saying whatever you want them to say.
Which does bring me to a real issue I have with McCain, and that's that while I have much respect and sympathy for his time spent in the Hanoi Hilton, he lost nearly all of that the moment he allowed the door to be opened even a tiny bit for sanctioned torture by U.S. forces. There's no practical and no moral justification, and he of all people should know that. Seemed to know that and say as much. That he would sacrifice that principle just to fit in with his party and to boost his "tough on terror" cred (as if he needs to) is very, very disappointing.
But that's been the trend since the last election cycle, everything I liked about McCain has been slipping away.
The enemies of Democracy are
"Trademarks are the heraldry of the new feudalism."
Oh, I dunno. Cheating bastards like Nixon and Clinton seemed to do rather well. It seems America save on very rare occasions picks one or the other, but rarely someone earnest and intelligent. Of course those kinds of guys are the ones that plunged the US into a civil war (Lincoln) or had the bad luck to see one of the most severe economic downturns in modern history during their term (Hoover).
The world's burning. Moped Jesus spotted on I50. Details at 11.